Thursday, 1 December 2016

Tea For One - Joe Bonamassa

The first day of Meteorological Winter looks as if iy will dawned in much the same way as had the last of November, with a temperature of -5°C, a reasonably heavy frost, no wind along with a stunning sunrise but small Birds particularly were scavenging what morsels they could find!

SUNRISE

Of Cabbages and Kings

and not to forget

WOOD PIGEONs
as Lewis Carroll might have written had he thought of it"The time has come," the Walrus said,
"To talk of many things:
Of shoes - and ships - and sealing-wax
Of cabbages - and kings
And why the sea is boiling hot
And whether pigs have wings."
as they nicked Hugh's brassicas!

At Parley Pond the British sub-species ofMUSCOVY DUCK
was firstly doing its impression of Roald Amundsen 10 minutes away from
the South Pole before

Skating on Thin Ice.

At the Irrigation Pond there were no more Wildfowl than c2

MUTE SWANs

which even then were pushed for space with no more than a 'postage stamp'
of open water.
With no time to jockey for position we captured, through the windscreen this

GOLDFINCH

finding some sustenance from the Teasels,
while all else on Parley Court Farm amounted only to c5

BULLFINCH

along with a couple of feeding

GREENFINCH

With little or no interest in the tiny Wader found at

LONGHAM LAKE
yesterday, firstly thought to be a 'possible' White-rumped Sandpiper
and then later a Semi-palmated Sandpiper, both vagrant from the Americas,
but a further report had highlighted c3 Great White Egrets
which were far more to my liking. We don't often go off piste and all
through the morning it was touch and go as to whether we would today.
At the 11th hour we bit the bullet and headed off on that epic 10 minute journey.

With the huge size of these beautiful creatures

they were not difficult to find or see

but never gave 'point blank' views.

Two of them were content to remain fixed on their

Island Refuge

while the third was most flighty. Just before we left it again took to the air
and gained great altitude and headed east, and at one point invaded

Parley Court Farm Airspace
another new species added to our
Recording Area List!
and what about the relevance of Tee (sic) For One we hear you ask?
On our way back to Slight Return we discovered this

'LONE' MUTE SWAN

on the 4th Tee which in our slightly warped thinking brought to mind
a play on words and the Joe Bonamassa 'cover' of the Led Zeppelin
track (from their 1976 album Presence)'Tea For One' Link

Personally I am not a great lover of 'cover versions' and no one messes with Led,
but this track, which first brought Mr Bonamassa to my attention, goes down as
the Golden Example of the Exception to the Rule. An extremely difficult number to sing,
I have practised it until black in the face but never subjected it to a live audience as
Bowie and Sheila would tell you!This Post is dedicated to those 2 Dear Friends, what a night that was!Sweet little Ille, you'll know her if you see herBlue eyes and a ponytailHer checks are rosy, she looks a little nosyMan, that little girl is fine.

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About Me

Born Beeston, Notts 1946, my family moved to Dorset 1959. Joined the Royal Navy age 15 years and 50 days serving 10 years. In frigates firstly then over 5 years in Submarines as a Seaman/Diver, reaching the dizzy heights of Leading Seaman before leaving to join the Merchant Service, working in Ocean Salvage and Harbour Tugs, passenger / cargo ships, trials vessels, etc. Qualified as Mate (Chief Officer) in 1976 and as Master (Captain) in 1978. For my final 20 years of 47 I worked in the Offshore Oil Industry initially on the drilling rig Stena Hunter, then the accommodation barge Borgland Dolphin and finally the Floating Production Platform Buchan Alpha. On the rigs I forged a number of long lasting friendships several of whom shared some of my extensive travels. Setting foot on Caymen, Bermuda, Bahamas and The Azores in March 2013 brought my countries total to 147. The best, undoubtedly, was Antarctica, followed by Australia, Mongolia, Belize, Zimbabwe, China and Madagascar, in no particular order. As for my greatest achievement in life, my 2 beautiful daughters bear witness to that. Love to all our readers, your in my thoughts. Bagsy